JOURNAL OF THE KYORIN MEDICAL SOCIETY
Online ISSN : 1349-886X
Print ISSN : 0368-5829
ISSN-L : 0368-5829
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Volume 44, Issue 3
Displaying 1-8 of 8 articles from this issue
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Original Article
  • Work conditions and fatigue symptoms among Japanese male emergency medical technicians (EMTs)
    hiroteru Okamoto, Takenobu Hosoda, Takako Wada, Koji Teruya, Tooru Tsu ...
    Article type: Original Article
    2013 Volume 44 Issue 3 Pages 127-136
    Published: 2013
    Released on J-STAGE: October 03, 2013
    DOIhttps://doi.org/10.11434/kyorinmed.44.127
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
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    Background: Emergency medical technicians (EMTs) are exposed to many high-risk factors in the course of their duties that influence their physical and mental health. EMTs seem to exhibit a high incidence of fatigue symptoms as a reaction to the stress of their duties. This study investigates the prevalence of fatigue symptoms among Japanese EMTs and examines the association between work conditions and fatigue symptoms during their routine duties.
    Methods: Subjects were 73 male Japanese EMTs employed by the X City Fire Bureau. We administered the Cumulative Fatigue Symptoms Index (CFSI) and a questionnaire to collect information about work conditions. Fatigue symptoms were compared by job class; correlation analyses were performed to investigate the relationship between work conditions and fatigue.
    Results: Though EMTs on the same team seemed to have the same work schedule, the results showed differences in fatigue symptoms between team leaders, squadsmen, and drivers. The longer hours spent on dispatch calls for medical transport was negatively correlated with “chronic tiredness” in leaders (r=-0.461, p<0.05), the longer hours of total meal break was negatively correlated with “decreased willingness to work” in both leaders and drivers (former: r=-0.434, latter: r=-0.549; both p<0.05), and that of chores was negatively correlated with “decreased willingness to work” in drivers (r=-0.555, p<0.01). However, napping was not significantly correlated with fatigue symptoms in our study sample.
    Conclusion: These results suggest that the long hours of meal break could be important in improving both willingness to work of leaders and drivers and general fatigue of drivers. The longer hours of total meal break may be important to recover from some part of fatigue symptoms in Japanese male EMTs.
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  • Single Nucleotide Polymorphisms of the ALK1 and ENG Genes in Patients with Pulmonary Arterial Hypertension
    yuki Aimi, Tomomi Hirayama, Masaharu Kataoka, Takumi Inami, Yuichi Mom ...
    Article type: Original Airticle
    2013 Volume 44 Issue 3 Pages 137-142
    Published: 2013
    Released on J-STAGE: October 03, 2013
    DOIhttps://doi.org/10.11434/kyorinmed.44.137
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
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    Background: Activin receptor-like kinase-1 (ALK1) and endoglin (ENG) genes are involved in the pathogenesis of the pulmonary arterial hypertension (PAH)-related diseases, hereditary hemorrhagic telangiectasia type 2 and type 1, respectively. Therefore, this study was conducted to investigate mutations in all exons of the ALK1 and ENG genes in the large Japanese PAH population.
    Methods: The study subjects were 144 adult PAH patients including 46 patients with idiopathic or familial PAH and 98 with other etiologies. Deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) was isolated from blood, and the amplified fragments after polymerase chain reaction were sequenced directly to detect mutations and single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) in ALK1 and ENG genes. Furthermore, gene frequency was compared between PAH population and control population using online database or DNA derived from 100 Japanese B cell lines in cases of the absence of online frequency data.
    Results: We found no pathogenic mutations in our study subjects, but, we found two missense mutations in the ENG gene, which may not account for the pathogenesis of PAH, and seven possible non-pathogenic SNPs in ALK1 and ENG genes in Japanese PAH patients. Among them, the gene frequency of missense mutations of the ENG gene (c.1096G＞C/p.Asp366His) was statistically higher in IPAH＋FPAH population than the control population.
    Conclusions: To our knowledge, this is the first report to elucidate mutations and SNPs of ALK1 and ENG genes in the large Japanese PAH population. In this study, gene frequencies of most SNPs in the ALK1 and ENG genes were not significantly different compared to control population. One missense mutation in the ENG gene was remained to elucidate whether the high frequency is due to the ethnic bias or the possible linking to a hidden pathogenic mutation.
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